With the preliminary test of the new client EA introduced the new ingame-currency "SpeedBoost" in Need for Speed World. SpeedBoost is a virtual currency which allows you to purchase digital contents in NFS World.

NFS World is a free-to-play game, but you can buy with real money SpeedBoost, to purchase new Power Ups, Amplifies and Rental Cars - either directly in the game or in the upcoming NeedforSpeed.com Web Store.

Additionally, an important fact is, that according to NFSUnlimited there won't be any content only available for paying users. You can get every item just by playing the game, but if you need more powerups, upgrades etc. immediately, SpeedBoost is a fast and easy way to give you the possibility to purchase these items. Especially the Car Rental feature sounds nice, which allows you to rent a powerful car for 24 hours, where you can try it, take it out for races and collect some serious rep.

SpeedBoost will be first available in the preliminary test this weekend. You can find more information about SpeedBoost in this article on the official website:

The fourth beta of Need for Speed World is coming up soon. Until then, EA invited the most active players from previous beta events to test the next game client, to ensure stability and performance. The main goal of this preliminary test is testing the new features, before the client is available for a wider audience in the next beta. The test runs from Friday until Sunday, 2nd May 2010.

Some of the new release features include new power ups, new cars, improved police encounters, visual updates to the world, and performance / stability optimization. The most important addition will be the ability to purchase power ups using the Need for Speed World in-game currency called SpeedBoost.

Once this preliminary test has been completed and we collect our test data / fix the critical bugs we’ll begin our preparation for rolling out the next Beta. For the next beta we’ll be re-inviting all the participants from all previous Betas, as well as inviting a lot more of you who haven’t yet had a chance to participate in the beta. We sincerely appreciate your patience.

You can find more information about this preliminary test on the official NFS World website:

In the article series All the World's a Stage the developers give insights in the visual development of the upcoming Need for Speed World.

In the fifth episode Eduardo Agostini talks about the development and visual progress, which was made in comparison to NFS Most Wanted or NFS Carbon.

This article contains an interesting detail: Agostini mentions that the previous Closed Beta Events of NFS World were played with a build from December 2009. In the next closed beta hopefully the new build is being used, which already has some bugs fixed, the users reported during the last beta events.

You can find the complete article and the previous "All the World's a Stage" episodes here:

Calling the car designers among you, if you want to see your own creation in Need for Speed World, you now have the possibility: Porsche agreed to give the players a chance to model the Porsche 959! With the "Create-A-Porsche 959 Contest" EA invites the NFS community to design a 3D model of this car to get included in the game.

You have time until April 25th, 2010 - if your car will be selected as the winner, it'll be driveable in the final version of Need for Speed World and you'll get credit for your creation. You can find more information and the official rules on the following website:

EA announced the third beta for Need for Speed World! While the first two events only were for one weekend, this time you get to play a whole week, starting on April 7th, 4pm (GMT) until April 14th, 7:59 (GMT)!

This beta many bugs from the first and second event were fixed. The goal of the third beta is to test fundamental functionality, both within the game and on the servers

Therefore, at certain points during the beta we will ask that all players participate in certain races or all engage in a police pursuit at the same time. When we need specific tests run we will communicate with the players through the in-game chat, on the NFS World forums and through the .

Please note that before every beta-event all data is being resetted and you will have to create a new driver profile.

If you're looking for opponents in multiplayer-races, you should definitely check out the NFS World PVP Events site, which will show what races people are queuing up to play the game. (Unfortunately currently it shows only an error message.)

If you want to participate at the beta, sign up on the NFS World website and hopefully you get selected for one of the future beta events.

As mentioned earlier, we can help you get in the beta by, forwarding accounts from our community to EA: just send us an e-mail to bs [at] nfsplanet [dot] com or a PM to Shocker with your EA account (e-mail address) you used for signing up for the NFS World beta. (Unfortunately it's too late for the third beta, but hopefully you can join one of the future beta events.)

The Apple iPad is coming! While the sale starts these days in the USA, all other countries will have to wait until the end of April. Anyway, Electronic Arts announced today a special version of Need for Speed Shift, especially designed for the iPad, which will be available on the AppStore!

It's not the iPhone game only on a larger screen - this NFS Shift was made for the iPad and features optimized physics-based 3D graphics for the new platform and stronger driving controls, with manual acceleration, a rearview mirror feature, along with visual shift and braking systems.

Additionally the game contains 8 new cars, so that you have 28 licensed cars to take out on a race on 18 different race tracks. NFS Shift for the iPad is available for $14.99 - the price for other countries than USA is not known yet.

You can find some impressions of the game in our screenshots-section, or just click on the following links to get more information about Apple's iPad or NFS Shift:

The annual easter egg search starts again at NFS-Planet! The easter bunny hid 10 easter eggs, just like the one you can see to your right.
Just browse through the site and if you can find at least 5 eggs, you get the chance to win one of the following prizes!

Whereever you find an easter egg, just click on it and it will be marked as "found". Of course you'll need a NFS-Planet account and you have to be logged in. Once you could find at least 5 eggs, you automatically participate in the raffle where you have the chance to win one of the following prizes:

2x NFS Shift for PS3

4x NFS Shift T-Shirt

5x Bad Company Sticker

3x NFS Shift Sticker

3x EA Keychain

The easter egg search is only open to egg hunters until April 7th 2010. The winners will be announced a few days later.

Rules:
Each person can only participate once. Registration of multiple accounts and unallowed manipulations are not permitted. A valid "discovery" of an egg is only the explicit click on an egg, which opens a popup and processes the discovery.
The winners agree that their names may be published on the NFS-Planet website.

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